good morning. a global rally. stocks trading higher around the world right now. the dow closing in on its second positive week in a row. >> apple responds. the tech giant firing back at the u.s. government in an official legal briefing. new this morning, some of apple's biggest rivals are coming to its defense. >> plus, the gloves come off in texas. gop presidential hopefuls go on the attack just days before super tuesday. it's friday, february 26th, 2016. "worldwide exchange" begins right now.

a very good morning. a warm welcome to "worldwide exchange" on this friday morning on cnbc. i'm wilfred frost joined today by kayla. in for sara. it might mean we can get through a whole show without mentioning steph curry or the yen, which is a welcome relief. >> so i won't mention the yen when we talk about the asia markets. >> no, we can. we always have to mention it. maybe not every 17th word. a very warm welcome to "wex" to you, kayla. let's get to the u.s. equity futures. a nice positive open to the tune of about 130 points to the dow. 137 points now, as you can see. the s&p called to open higher by about 20 points. the nasdaq by 50. the s&p and the dow both going into positive territory for the week and for the month as well. >> we've been able to see the u.s. equity futures rallying throughout the morning because of what's happening in the global markets this morning. let's look at where we are across the world right now. in europe after the open, a

sharp rally out the gates. germany up by 2.5%. france up by 2.3%. the ftse 100 is holding up about 1.5% into positive territory. we have ireland elections today. we have eurozone economic sentiment. we also have q-4 gdp. a lot to work with within europe. in asia, where we are seeing perhaps a rally on the back of that g-20 meeting in shanghai. we are seeing the shanghai comp up about 1%. hong kong is up 2.5%. shenzhen is down, albeit slightly, for where we closed today. >> do you think we can put any of this positivity down to the g-20? >> i think that would hold a selloff at bay, at the very least. perhaps not a big rally, but at least you're not going to get any sort of broad selling when you have all of those leaders there, all of this rhetoric about trying to keep the global economy stabilized. perhaps it's just a day

phenomenon. >> exactly right. we have the china central bank governor as well saying he has levers to pull, perhaps getting a bit of confidence. the bank of england governor was speaking earlier, saying don't blame central bankers. there's other people to look at, as well. a lot of finger pointing. in general, i think we've just found a little bit of a bounce. oil sparked it halfway through the week. in general, it's continued through. i am surprised by the extent of the gains, particularly in europe towards the end of the week. the ftse 100 remarkably resilient this week in the face of brexit fears. finishing the week very strongly, having yesterday been up 2.5% itself. >> although, for the ftse, a couple week to go before march 10th. here are the big stories we're watching at this hour. g-20 finance ministers gathering for a summit in shanghai this weekend. among the headlines, the head of china's central bank promising his country won't stage another devaluation of its currency. he also argues that pboc still

has tools to deal with potential downside risks to china's economy. meantime, imf chief christine lagarde is warning large capital outflows from china do pose risks to the global economy. in corporate news, apple is fighting back against the u.s. government. the company argues the fbi's demand that it unlock an iphone belonging to one of the san bernardino shooters violates free speech rights and overrides the will of congress. we'll have more on that story in just a bit. and deal or no deal. top executives from sharp and foxconn plan to meet in china today. this is just a day after foxconn put its takeover of the japanese electronics giant on hold, saying it wouldn't sign the deal due to previously undisclosed liability. sharp shares down about 11.59%. despite that move, asia is green. >> it is indeed. that's not quite eradicating the big decline in shanghai

yesterday. the other big story this morning, the republican slug fest. the dplgloves coming off last night. ted cruz and marco rubio attacking gop presidential front runner donald trump. >> he hired workers from poland, and he had to pay $1 million in a judgment. >> that's wrong. totally wrong. >> people can look it up. i'm sure people are googling it right now. trump polish workers. you'll see a million dollars for hiring illegal workers on one of his projects. >> i really find it amazing that donald believes he's the one who discovered the issue of illegal immigration. when i ran for senate here in the state of texas, i ran promising to lead the fight against amnesty, promising to fight to build a wall, and in 2013, when i was leading the fight against the gang of eight amnesty bill, where was donald? he was firing dennis rodman on "celebrity apprentice." >> this was the final republican debate before next week's super

tuesday contest. we'll have much more from the campaign trail in about 20 minutes' time. fascinating, that debate. let's get to the broader markets and have a look at oil prices. they've been absolutely crucial for equity market movements this week. a strong day to end the week as well. 33.9 for wti. it's up 2.5%. we just have to rewiped nd to wednesday to see the impact of oil. strong correlation once again between oil and equities this week. we look at the ten year. 1.73% the latest yield on the ten-year note. there hasn't been too much movement in that this week. again, highlighting it hasn't really been global growth nears but other factors like oil. the dollar this morning, not too much movement overall. pretty much flat against the euro and the yen. the pound, for once, showing a little bit of green this week.

gold, as we know, had a good bounce in january and most of february. just losing a little bit of steam at the end of the month. >> perhaps hitting a technical level. can't go any higher. that's what traders are saying this morning. we're wrapping up the trading week with a fair amount of economic data. the second read on fourth quarter gdp is out at 8:30 a.m. eastern. growth is expected to be revised lower from 0.7 to 0.4%, which would mean the fed hiked rates in december when the economy was still slowing down. that could stoke critics on that one. also at 8:30, look for december trade deficit numbers as well as january personal income and spending. at 10:00 a.m., we get the final report on february consumer sentiment. if you thought you were going to coast into the weekend, not so today. >> absolutely right. let's get a trader's perspective

of the day ahead. brian kelly joins us on the cnbc newsline. do you care about this gdp print we get later? or is the only thing that mattered the oil prices? >> you said it, wilfred. it's oil, oil, oil. there's a bit of a relief rally going on here. people are expecting that some of these cuts in production are going to start filtering into the market. over the next couple months, we're going to have less produced, at least here in the u.s. with the statements from saudi arabia and iran that they're not going to cut production, oil should have probably fallen this week and it didn't. so that's got people a little bit excited, i guess, that perhaps maybe we've stabilized here. that filters into everything else. so i think that's probably the big news of the week. >> brian, is there any sigh of relief for the fact that retail earnings are largely behind us and there was a lot of bad news baked into what we were expecting from them? >> yeah, i think what you said there was relief. we're looking at a relief rally on multiple fronts.

we've gotten through some of those retail earnings. now we have the gdp print, which is going to be last month. now looking forward, we've got multiple central banks. we've got the ecb next week, which is expected to do some fairly heavy cutting and more into negative territory. then we have the fed coming up. there's a lot of things out there that people are looking to. they have this relief that perhaps maybe central bankers have something left in the gas tank. i happen to be a skeptic on that. but hey, listen, for right now, things are green. >> brian, we're looking at a second week in a row of gains for the dow. we're positive in the dow and s&p for february as well. when we consider all of the fears of 2016, be it china, central bank weakness, oil prices, and so on and so forth, do investors now think that those issues have been solved? why are we in positive territory for the month as a whole? >> yeah, that's a great question. i don't think investors necessarily think they've been solved. i think they've been put on hold

for a very short period of time. at least some hope that maybe there's some progress for it. i mean, g-20 generally isn't a big thing that i pay attention to. however, there is some talk coming out that there might be a glint of cooperation, which is ultimately what we need. so that's giving some hope out there. we have month end, so you know there's month end flows coming in. there's a convergence of several different factors. but i don't think anything has been solved. china certainly has not been solved. pmis, the global economy seems to be deteriorating after a blip up in january. i don't think anything's been solved. it's just a short-term pause. >> brian, thanks so much for getting up with us this morning. >> my pleasure. >> particular thanks to him. he's got a long wait until "fast money." >> yes, he does. very long day for brian. meanwhile, apple filing a formal

legal response to the u.s. government, asking the court to drop its demands that the tech giant help the fbi unlock the san bernardino terrorist's iphone. major tech companies like microsoft, google, facebook, and others all standing in support, saying they plan to file briefs backing the tech giant next week in federal court. but how does apple fare in the court of public opinion? landon dowdy joins us now with more on that. >> kayla, good morning. good to have you in. ceo tim cook thinks unlocking the iphone would set a dangerous precedent, putting all customers at risk. but do actual iphone users agree? >> i have to side with the government at this point. >> i don't believe the government has the authority to make a private entity create some kind of back door. >> apple should definitely unlock the phone. >> i agree with tim cook. i think opening it up creates access to anybody. >> and it raises the question,

could tim cook's lack of cooperation put a bad taste in consumers' mouths and stop them from buying apple products? >> it's difficult because they have such a foothold in the market, but i would definitely think twice. >> no, i've been iphone all the way since they got it. i love it. >> the fact of the matter is apple is so big, we have to buy through that system. but it wouldn't be -- i wouldn't feel great about it. >> so kayla, wilfred, as you can see, there's no indifference here. either you afwrgree or disagree. so far, we've seen no material impact on apple sales. >> landon, thank you very much for that. i suppose as well as no real impact on sales, not much impact on the stock price either. it hasn't really affected sentiment in the stock market. >> there's a sense it could be years before we actually get a ruling on exactly who will win and who will lose this case. meanwhile, stocks to watch today. strong holiday sales helped bolster jcpenney's results.

the retailer posting earnings that beat and also provided an upbeat outlook. those shares had up nearly 3% in the premarket. gap's full-year profit forecast falling short of estimates. it was way down by a strong dollar. there were also weak sales at its banana republic chain. that stock is down 3%. weight watchers reporting a big drop in sales as it lost more subscribers. that happened despite the recent endorsement from oprah winfrey, which hasn't fueled big customer gains. perhaps that's a pun in the teleprompter. the stuck had been on a rise because oprah had been endorsing this company for months. >> big, big fall today. 24%. ouch. other stocks to watch today, splunk offering a full-year consensus up 13% in premarket trade. palo alto networks topping

estimates. that's at the best part of 5%. and intuit swung to a profit, helped by demand for its tax prep software. that's up a nice 3.3%. still to come here on "worldwide exchange," henry paulson is call can go on china to let companies fail. we'll hear from the former treasury secretary on the sidelines of the g-20 meet income shanghai next. >> first, we want to hear from you. our twitter and facebook question this morning, markets are in positive territory for the week, but why do you think it is they have recovered? is it oil? is it consumer strength? or is it because we're ignoring china? or perhaps is there a sliver of faith in the g-20? tell us on twitter. @cnbcwex. we'll be right back. you get use to pet odors in your car.

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welcome back to "worldwide exchange." on to today's trade of the day. we've all heard the adage, buy low, sell high. but did you know the saying is backed by historical data? technical analysts used the philosophy to find oversold stocks based on their trading history. that's what our data team did. they found ulta salon, illumina, and perrigo, in addition to discovery, are all oversold, due for a pop potentially next week. to find out why, go to cnbc.com and check out cnbc pro. >> very nice. g-20 finance leaders gathering for a summit in shanghai this weekend. that's why we find eunice, who

caught up with hank paulson today. what did he have to say? >> reporter: well, had he a lot to say, wilfred. persistent worries about china's slowdown and beijing's ability to manage it have really been a key risk of the global economy. when i spoke to hank paulson, he said that the chinese leadership here does have a messaging challenge, but they are taking steps to address it. this is what he had to say. >> as i said in my speech, they're always adapting, always learning. i'm someone that learned that messaging is a very difficult thing when it comes to the market. part of it is substance, and part of it is messaging. so as i said, i think a big part of things they can do is they can show right now they're very serious about dealing with inefficient, state-owned enterprises by letting some

companies fail. >> reporter: and in fact, chinese leaders today, as well as yesterday, were really messaging that they understand the need for greater transparency in their policymaking. the chinese central bank governor held a press conference, which some officials said was a sign of a need for a more openness and a willingness to have more openness. also, the central bank governor made some remarks today. he spoke in english, which was seen as a way for him to speak directly to global investors. he said that based on the fundamentals, he didn't see a basis of persistent rmd depreciation. he also said the chinese central bank, from their point of view, believed they had enough tools in their tool box to stimulate the economy. that's really been taken as a sign, guys, from investors that china could see more interest rates to come. back to you. >> eunice, the other thing i

suppose that's been discussed over the course of the week is whether we're going to get any kind of coordinated fiscal stimulus from the countries gathering there. have you heard any talk of that? is that just hearsay, do we they? >> reporter: well, the central bank governor of china also said what you had said, which is he was hoping to see some coordinated policy response. in terms of anything concrete, it's still very difficult to say. you're talking about several countries getting together and trying to coordinate policy not only on monetary and fiscal side, and that is a big challenge. another subject that did come up was the need for structural reforms. the oecd was calling for g-20 nations to really speed up their efforts to reform their economies. in fact, that was another key topic that paulson had brought up, saying that china really needed to double down on their reform efforts in order to build

up their credibility with investors. >> eunice, thank you for joining us, as ever. coming up, a republican slug fest ahead of next week's super tuesday elections. the highlights of last night's gop debate straight ahead. >> but first, as we head to break, here's today's forecast from the weather channel's reynolds wolf. >> hi, wilfred and kayla. good morning, great people. we have a chance of scattered snow showers across parts of the great lakes and into the ohio valley. moving into the northeast. nothing too substantial. more rain drops developing out for the pacific northwest along parts of the i-5 corridor. in terms of anything really heavy, not in the cards for you today. what will be in the cards, though, is not something you're going to see but rather you're going to feel. temperatures mild across parts of the central-southern plains. up in bismarck, only 55 degrees today. 53 in atlanta. 37 in new york city. back out to the west, beautiful times in los angeles with 78 degrees. folks, you're watching cnbc.

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welcome back to "worldwide exchange." in political news, republican presidential hopefuls slug it out on the debate stage in houston last night. for now, they've gone their separate ways with hopes of changing their super tuesday primary map. nbc's edward lawrence joins us from washington with that story. >> reporter: good morning. in a slug fest, the five remaining republican candidates traded jabs, and in some cases

jokes in order to get air time during the last debate before super tuesday. >> you get along with nobody. >> reporter: the debate contentio contentious. >> this guy is a choke artist, and this guy is a liar. >> reporter: donald trump was attacked from the right and left by senators ted cruz and marco rubio, who joined in a tag team to knock trump out of favor with voters. >> anyone who really cared about illegal immigration wouldn't be hiring illegal immigrants. >> you're the only person on this stage that's ever been fined for hiring people to work on your projects illegally. >> no, no, i'm the only one on the stage that's hired people. you haven't hired anybody. >> reporter: rubio went on an all-out offensive against trump, attacking not only his immigration ideas but his health care plan, among other issues. >> so that's the only part of the plan? just the competition? >> you have many different plans. you'll have competition. you'll have so many different plans. >> now he's repeating himself.

>> talking about repeating, i watched him repeat himself five times four weeks ago. >> i saw you repeat yourself five times five seconds ago. >> reporter: the fighting led to this moment by ben carson, who felt he could not get air time. >> can somebody attack me, please? >> reporter: last night's debate set the stage for voters to decide on super tuesday. and trump is winning or slightly winning in all of the polls for super tuesday's states, except one, texas. senator ted cruz is winning in texas. his home state, the state he represents in congress. reporting live in washington, edward lawrence. back to you. >> edward, thank you very much for that fascinating debate. we'll be discussing it more later in the show as well. sports news this morning. fifa delegates from all over the world are in zurich today to elect a new president to replace the disgraced sepp blatter. several top fifa officials have been arrested and charged with corruption. blatter has been banned from

football activities for six years. on thursday, the five candidates made last-minute attempts to secure votes in a series of public and behind the scenes meetings. the race appears to be focused on three men. that vote comes up today. whatever the result, we hope that football sorts itself -- sorry, soccer, sorts itself out. >> you can say football. it's safe here. >> yeah, but it's totally misunderstood when we're talking about soccer. even this early hour when we have viewers back in europe. i've learned i need to say soccer. i hold on to a few other words which confuse people. >> i know there are a lot of corporate sponsors that are watching that situation very closely. visa, coca-cola. >> yeah, mcdonald's. absolutely. >> when we come back on "worldwide exchange," we'll have this morning's top stories. plus, deutsche bank chief u.s. economist joe lavorgna will join us. find out what he's expecting from today's big gdp report.

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good morning. tgif. green arrows around the world today as stocks rally to end the week. >> a republican rumble. the gloves come off in the final gop debate before super tuesday. >> and a toast to jack ma. what the billionaire chinese businessman is buying in france. here's a hint.

it involves a va. you're watching "worldwide exchange" on cnbc. good morning and welcome back to "worldwide exchange" on cnbc. if you're just getting up, a very good morning to you. i'm wilfred frost joined today by kayla tausche. good morning to you. >> good morning. >> among the stories front and center today, g-20 finance ministers gathering for a summit in shanghai this weekend. among the headlines out of the meetings, so far the head of china's central bank promises his country won't stage another devaluation of its currency. imf chief christine lagarde is warning large capital outflows from china pose risks to the global economy. and the oecd is calling on the g-20 to produce an urgent fix for growth woes. in corporate news, apple is fighting back against the u.s. government in a legal brief filed late yesterday. the company argues that the fbi

demand it unlock an iphone belonging to the san bernardino shooters violates the constitution. let's get a check on global markets this morning, which have been in the green throughout the morning. take a look at where u.s. equities stand at this moment. we have been in positive territory. although, it is a thinly traded market, it is a closely watched one. the s&p 500, if it were to open on the volume right now, would open up 16 points. the dow would be up 129 points. the nasdaq would be up 45 as we eye gains for the major averages for the week. although, we still have one trading day of february left. europe is rallying today. we have q-4 gdp in france. ireland's elections.

a lot of data coming out stateside. you can see we're in rally mode from the open in europe. germany faring the best, up by about 2.3%. france up more than 2%, as is italy. the ftse and spain's index are just below 2% for the gains. and asia, as we were just talking about, that meeting of g-20 finance ministers in shanghai, have been able to at least stay stable. the nikkei closing just up by a third of 1%. hong kong is up by about 2.5%. shenzhen is flat but slightly down, although we have seen quite a bit of volatility in asia throughout the week. >> we certainly have. yesterday big declines for the shanghai market. interesting to see the pboc governor trying to give a bit of clarity about what they're trying to do. he promised no further sharp devaluations of the currency. whether or not you believe they can achieve that, it's nice for once to get some communication from the pboc, particularly on the currency. that was one of the big issues at the start of the year. people didn't foe what they were trying to do with it. he's come out and said, we have

got more levers to pull, we're in control of t and we won't surprise the market again. >> to have him say no sharp moves at all in the yuan, i think, would have placated the market even further. devaluation is one thing, but they've been sharply moving to quietly repeg it to the dollar throughout the last few weeks. i think just the surprise factor is what the market doesn't like. at least they know it's not going one direction sharply. >> exactly right. or at least that's the intention. we'll remain to see if they can keep control of it. let's have a looked a broader markets. oil prices front and center this week. we're seeing green matched in the equity markets and oil prices today. crude at 33.7, up 2%. brent, the international gauge, just shy of 36 bucks. let's also have a look at currency movement this morning. not too much happening there. we've seen most of the currencies flat. the ten-year note is at 1.735.

there are the currency moves for you. a little bit of strength for the pound. gold finding some resistance levels after a strong january and february. it's up half a percent today at 1232. let's get more perspective on the markets. joining us now is joe lavorgna. is that gdp print more important than normal? >> it is. normally the markets don't focus so much on the second print to gdp. given how volatile they've been and how much recession risk there is, and the possibility that growth is revised down from 0.7% to something maybe closer to zero, certainly that might get people nervous. not only that, people will use the data to perhaps look at their kurnt quarter numbers and rejigger things a big.

we always forecast and part off the levels of the previous quarter. i do think it'll be important. but the tone in the markets has improved in the last few days. >> it does seem like the market has prepared itself for worse than expected news, but there have been a few surprises. people are saying, wait a minute, maybe the manufacturing sector isn't as bad as we thought it was. do you think that it's too soon to start thinking about those story lines? >> yes, kayla. i absolutely do. certainly the data -- even the last few weeks have surprised investors to the upside. the data certainly better than i thought. having said that, the fundamental problems really haven't been fixed. we still have a very elevated currency that's up significantly from where it was 18 months ago. we still see very wide credit spreads. we're still seeing senior loan officers among u.s. banks tighten lending standards. we still have excessive

inventory positions in manufacturing. while i don't believe there's a recession coming, i do believe the near-term outlook for growth is still quite soft, that the current quarter will not be the 2%-plus that the consensus is looking for. therefore, investors might have another case of the jitters over the next few months when they see data that will reweaken again. >> would you welcome an about turn by the fed to abandon this normalization policy and go back on the easing path, perhaps them bratsing things like negative rates like we've seen in places like japan? or is monetary policy no longer the answer? has monetary policy been tried and frankly failed because it's only delivering these very low growth rates? >> i don't know if monetary policies failed. certainly we have the law of diminishing returns. we're not going to get much more, in my opinion, from lower rates. we see the ten-year notes 1.73. it's down significantly on the year. our strategists believe rates are going lower. i don't think it's a cost of

money issue. i don't think the fed is going to be easing any time soon unless the economy were to roll over. that's not my expectations. what i do believe will happen is the fed is sort of backing away from near-term hikes. my guess is they're not going to raise rates until december at the earliest. effectively, the markets are guessing the fed is relenting, at least in the short term. that's helped the dollar not go up as much. it is off a little bit. that might be enough. but i don't expect negative rates unless things got really bad in the u.s. even there, the fed may not do it perhaps just because of the politics of it and the fact that you see in places like the bank of japan. the response hasn't been what it was thought to be. >> joe, thanks for getting up early with us this morning. other stocks we're watching today, rbs reporting its eighth straight annual loss. the bank continues to be weighed down by restructuring and legal costs for years and years. it feels like déjà vu. they're also delaying the

prospect of any dividend payouts. that stock, like many of the european banks, is down 8%. >> despite european markets rallying toward the end of the week, it's worth pointing that out. standard chartered started the week terrible. rbs started the week terrible. still very, very soft. >> perhaps uniquely, majority owned by the u.k. government. the brunt of the loss here, ironically, is not necessarily being felt by the shareholders but in fact by the government itself. >> the government in small part, not in total, but nonetheless, it points to that wider profitability issue that we know has been an issue on the continent with the likes of deutsche bank and also in the u.k. lloyds, rbs, very domestic-focused banks. >> still a few banks left to report, so that trend will only continue. moving back on, kraft heinz's fourth quarter results beat forecasts, due mostly to cost cutting. the food giant says strong growth in ketchup and sauces was offset by lower shipments of

ready to drink beverages, frozen meals, and coffee. do they say ketchup in the u.k.? >> ketchup, yes. how would it be? >> just checking. >> the preceding word we pronounce differently. tomato. >> there we go. baidu's fourth quarter revenue rose 33%. that beat estimates driven by ad spending. it was the slowest quarterly sales growth for the company that's often called china's google. warning revenue growth will slow further in the first quarter. they're investing in more tangible goods, delivery, infrastructure. similar to alibaba. stock up 9% on that sales beat. >> and if we see that chart again, a nice rally throughout the last six weeks or so. one of the stocks in china that's managed to shrug off concerns of the recent weeks in the start to the year.

other stocks to watch, goldcorp. reporting a big fourth quarter loss. the company expects gold production to fall this year. it remains focused on cost cutting efforts. down 7.5% in premarket. herballife in talks with the federal trade commission over the probe of its business practices related to accusations made by hedge fund manager bill ackman. the outcome of the talks uncertain. it bounced significantly today, up 13%. monster beverages' fourth quarter results were much lower than expected. demand for its products remain strong, but the company was hurt by weak foreign currency and inventory shift. do down 7.5%. >> now for today's top trending stories. is jack ma getting into the wine business? the alibaba ceo has reportedly purchased a vineyard and chateau in france. while the price of the purchase was not disclosed, a vineyard and castle on more than 200

acres likely came at a steep price. he's just building this real estate portfolio. he bought the second most expensive home in the world. $193 million. what's being described as a bungalow in hong kong. he bought property in upstate new york. now perhaps a vineyard. but i don't think he drinks wine. >> i don't care about the property part so much, but the wine part. we know the chinese really have a taste for french wine. they also love alibaba. do you think he's going to brand it chateau baba and release his own branded wine? >> or perhaps strike an import deal to bring nancy french wine to china. >> we'll have to see. sea world admitted on its earnings call that employees have posed as animal rights activists as a way to get intel on their opposition. the ceo added the company will end its practice of spying but defended it on the grounds of employee and customer safe tiff. the company has been fighting off animal rights groups like

peta since the 2013 documentary "blackfish" alleged it mistreats its orca whales. still to come, today's must reads, including whether the brakes were just put on donald trump's seemingly unstoppable drive to the republican nomination after his rivals stopped sniping each other and turned their attention squarely on the gop front runner. you're watching "worldwide exchange" on cnbc, first in business worldwide. stay with us. you can't predict the market. but through good times and bad... ...at t. rowe price... ...we've helped our investors stay confident for over 75 years. call us or your advisor. t. rowe price. invest with confidence. plumping surface cells for a dramatic transformation. without the need for fillers. your concert tee might show your age...your skin never will.

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welcome back. now to today's must-read stories catching our attention. my pick today isn't, in fact, from the "financial times." if sara is watching, she'll be surprised to hear that. it's from "the new york times." it's titled "five big questions after a gop debate that targeted trump." something profound happened on the stage in houston on thursday night. both marco rubio and ted cruz stopped focusing on each other long enough to turn towards the person who's actually beating them both. it seems surprising,kayla, it's taken them so long to do this. i suppose it's really a factor of it taking so long to get down to fewer candidates on stage at all, but they both really attacked him pretty hard. this article explaining whether that's going to be too little, too late. but they got some traction last night. >> the stakes are so high. when donald trump was polling at 30%, this was this idea that 70%, the majority of republicans, actually wanted to vote for someone else. once the race would narrow down, they would get to do that.

but donald trump has consolidated a lot of those voters, even in florida, where marco rubio is, of course, from. i think that surprised a lot of people. i think they're realizing that maybe it's not a shoo-in. maybe they have a lot of hard work to do. >> absolutely. a lot of focus on tuesday. the other thing, should someone have organized a search party for ben carson and john kasich, who didn't get much air time at all. poor guys. there with ege go. we're approaching the top of the hour. joe kernen joins us with a look at what's coming up. good morning. a few days ago, a lot of red across the screen. we've managed to eke out gains for the week, possibly for the month as a whole. what do you put it down to? >> you really want to talk about that, wilfred? i could get that from sara. i was going to talk about frank bruney quickly. then we can talk about that. sara has quoted him too. he was a restaurant critic. did you know that? he was "the new york times"

restaurant critic. but that's okay. this whole thing to you, wilfred, this whole political circus you're watching, i know you're sitting back and going, you know, i'm kind of new here, is this really the way it works in this country? there's a little bit of, not smugness, but you're sort of looking at it, and it almost makes your process over there in the u.k. look reasonable, doesn't it? >> well, i don't know. there's a lot of craziness going on in british politics and european politics. i wouldn't say that. >> i think it's misery loves company at this point. although, you're doing it in kind of a sort of, well, look at these cowboys. i don't know when you'd say it that way. you know what else struck me? kayla, i thought "squawk box" was special. when she came here, i thought there was a reason. you found a show earlier than "squawk box," kayla? anything earlier than that, it's going to have to be jimmy fallon for you to show up for. you're a trooper. >> i loved when jimmy fallon got "the tonight show." and he said, i can't wait to do a show that airs today instead

of tomorrow. but if i could find something overnight, that would really be ideal. >> you're doing a yesterday almost today, kayla. >> joe, you're very welcome to get up earlier one day and come and sit here on the "worldwide exchange" desk as well. >> i might do that, wilfred. i need an invite from you. i don't know. i read frank. he's a little out there on one side or the other. i don't know. this whole thing is pretty amazing. do you think they landed a glove last night on the donald? he's got a solid 35%, 40% of people that just want something done because they're mad. blue collar types. great americans but just are tired of it. i'm not sure anything is going to dissuade them. >> joe, we're going to have to wrap it. they landed a punch, but they need to land more before tuesday if they're going to make an impact. >> he's going to win most of them. i don't know. super tuesday, you know, it's getting -- it almost looks

inevitable. i like "the wall street journal" piece that talks about republicans are going to outsource the criticism of the democrats because they haven't been able to do it themselves. you know guys like david brock and the clintons, they're going to do that trump university nonstop along with the bankruptcies. it's going to be ugly. you think this is bad now. >> joe, we're going to have to leave it there. >> all right, easy. these wraps aren't important. >> i still hear joe talking. coming up, our next guest says the markets are grappling with three major issues that aren't likely to be resolved this year. pimco's tony crescenzi joins us next. we need fresh ideas! >>got it. we slow, we die. >>what about cashing out? no! i'm trying to build something here. >>how about using fedex ground for shipping? >>i don't need some kid telling me how to run a business! i've been doing this for 4 long months.

>>fedex ground can help us save money and deliver fast to our customers. not bad, kid. you remind me of a younger me. >>aiden! the dog is eating your retainer again. let's take a short 5-minute recess. fedex ground is faster to more locations than ups ground.

welcome back to "worldwide exchange" on cnbc. joining us now is tony crescenzi. appreciate you getting up this

morning. we have a lot on tap. we have consumer sentiment data. we have q-4 gdp, or the most recent gdp reprint. i'm wondering what you think about the data going into today and whether you think there's anything that could derail what appears to be a rally to end the week. >> you could say there's been a trifecta of good news or information on areas of macro information. there have been three areas that markets have been worried about this year, three macro stories. one, of course, is energy. one, of course, is china. and the u.s. economy. whether or not it's dipping toward recession. it seems the news lately has been a little better. on the economy, and as you mention mentioned, some data being released today, generally speaking much at data in the past few weeks have been a little better than expected. certainly not recession like. on energy, there's been news lately suggesting that producers are showing some consternation

about current prices and trying to work together to at least cap output and maybe some day cut output. on china, news overnight by the pboc governor, seemed to suggest china is getting the message from christine lagarde at the imf and others that china should communicate better its policies regarding its foreign exchange rate. he did deliver a speech that seemed to suggest there's a greater understanding of that. most of what he said seems to suggest stability more likely than not. on this trifecta of information on these major macro factors, it does look a little better than it did a few weeks ago. even if there's some news today on the economy that's a little weaker, squishy if you will, more than likely these big issues will going to be dominant. >> tony, we've got some odd

forces playing out on the u.s. bond market at the moment. in one sense, it's a safe haven during what's been a very volatile year. so you're seeing some buying. of course, you have the fed trying to raise rates. so where is pimco buying on the u.s. treasury curve at the moment? where is there still value in of course, yields pretty low, 1.7% on the ten year. >> the intermediate portion of the curve is what provides bond investors the best so-called carry. it's a little too technical, but i could easily describe it in one way. think of a five-year treasury security and how in a year, because it ages, it becomes a four year. it rolls down the curve. the yield on a four year is less than that of a five year. that means the yield will be falling throughout the next year. now, looking out the curve, moving from a 30 year to a 29 year, as that ages, the pick up in price movement would be less than it would be in a five year. plus, the interests rates one

must take moving into a 30 year, it's much higher. one would own about a quarter r of what one would own in the five year. to sum it up, the intermediate part of the curve is what looks most attractive from a technical perspective because it carries well. >> okay. tony, thanks so much for joining us this morning. much appreciated. just a minute left. it's friday. that means it's time for our chart of the week. i've gone for the pound. i have to on this week of brexit fears. it really fell out of bed hard at the start of the week. >> below 1.40 again. >> it was briefly below 1.39, which meant it was a the a seven-year low. i think we're going to expect more volatility and weakness in the pound as we approach june. >> and the results of our twitter and facebook polls before we go. we asked you why the markets have recovered this week. the majority of you saying the bounce in oil prices. 54% of respondents said oil. >> lots of correlation between oil and equities this week. a quick look at futures. >> very little faith in the g-20. >> a quick look at futures.

pointing to a positive open. that's it for "worldwide exchange." "squawk box" is coming next. have a very lovely morning.

good morning. we're kicking off friday with a rally in stocks. green arrows in asia and europe, and futures here pointing to a higher open on wall street. the dow is closing in on its second positive week in a row. apple firing back in its battle with the government. the company asking a federal judge to reverse her ruling. and new this morning, apple again is getting support from some of its biggest rivals. plus, a political battle royale in texas just days before super tuesday. how cool is it that h.w. was there even though jeb was out?

anyway, the gop candidates were totally in attack mode. the target, donald trump. it's friday, february 26th, 2016, and "squawk box" begins right now. live from new york, where business never sleeps, this is "squawk box." that was a rockette move. >> i think i pulled something. >> good morning and welcome to "squawk box" here on cnbc. andrew and becky are off today. let's start with the markets. u.s. equity futures are looking positive this morning, adding to yesterday's gains. the dow, if it opened now, would be up by 133 points. the s&p by 17 points. the nasdaq by nearly 46 points. that's after yesterday's 212-point gain for the dow. the index is now 9% off its most recent 52-week